British Shadowhunters
by inmcc
Summary: I figured I could write about what's going on in the London Institute. Idk, there's Shadowhunters all over the world right? So I thought it would be fun :)
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Hi! It's me, Is. You probably know me for my Divergent Fanfic. Well, one of my best friends told me to try out for a TMI/TID one, and as those books are like GODDAMN AMAZING I figured I might as well go for it. So here it is! :D

I'd just like to recall you that it's based on CASSANDRA CLARE'S books, so I don't get credit for most stuff, and that I'm Portuguese so I'm really sorry for my bad spelling or phrase construction.

**Chapter One**

The summer breeze comes in, making my hair dangle. I feel the sweat on the back of my neck and on my forehead. I feel like I've just woken up from a fuzzy dream and open my eyes. As I look around, I almost lose my balance. _Why am I standing on a wooden board forty feet away from the ground?!_

I strain to keep my breath calm and my mind focused on a way out of here – one that won't mean certain death – when I hear a voice calling me out.

"That's cheating, you know?" I hear the so familiar British accent and the memories start to hit me. I close my eyes once more, as though trying to make them last.

Not two months ago I'd been attacked by a demon who has taken away my memories. Unfortunately half of my friends were already injured so neither of us managed to catch the damn beast – or at least that's what I was told.

I passed out right after I was attacked and only woke up four days later on the Silent City. That's supposed to be my first memory after the attack, but all I can remember are flashes of it.

I remember the circles and the voices in my head while the parabatai ceremony took place. Then I blacked out just to wake up a couple of hours later back on the Institute with new unknown runes all over my body. Not that I could remember the ones I had before – to be honest I was a little freaked out at the time -, but those just felt... different; like they burnt even if no one was touching me with a stele.

I feel my hair being put behind my earlobe and I open my eyes. My parabatai is standing in front of me with his expression full of concern.

"Em, you okay?" For a second I look at him blankly, still lost in thoughts. "Emma?! Emma, do you know who I am?! Please tell me you remember me!" I can sense the panic in his voice starting to grow. Leo's the only one who knows that I didn't just lose my past memories that day. That the new ones just keep on fading as well, as if there wasn't a place in my mind to keep them safe.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine." I lie, as always.

And as always, he doesn't buy it.

"Let me see it."

I immediately put my hand over the rune on the back of my neck. Leo has to redraw this rune every night – memory runes are supposed to be for life, but mine loses its power after a few hours.

"I said it's _fine. _Isn't it time for dinner yet?" We'd been practicing all day and the room is starting to darken. No matter how hard I want to get back on the streets there's not much I can do at night.

I turn around on my feet in order to get down through the ladder but Leo grabs me by the arm, making my skin burn – I really need to get used to all this parabatai thing, or else I'm going to have an heart attack every time he touches me.

"Jump." He says.

"What?!" I think I misheard him.

"Jump." This time he points his finger to the ground, making sure I understand.

"You're seriously not expecting me to jump from a height of forty feet are you?" I ask, in disbelief.

"Well, I _seriously _liked the fearless you better." He copies my voice perfectly while saying the world 'seriously', making me pinch my lips. "Are you, or are you not, a Nephilim after all?" And with these words he lets himself fall. I hold my breath for the whole time until he flips and falls on his feet without a sound.

I hated when he played the Nephilim card, because pretty much he was asking. "Do you, or do you not, want your memories back?" And I couldn't say no to the thing I wanted the most.

I close my eyes and let myself fall – the best Shadowhunter doesn't need to _see _the ground, it can _feel_ it. I don't remember flipping like Leo did, but as soon as I feel my feet softly meeting the stoned floor I open my eyes.

Still; not soon enough. Leo has already grabbed me by my black tank top and is putting my dirty blonde hair to the side so he can get a good view of my memory rune.

"Enjoying yourself back there, are we?" I ask, with no sympathy in my voice.

"It's fading, Em. It didn't even reach a full day." Leo's the only one who calls me Em. I feel the tip of his stele touching the back of my neck. Most runes burn when they're made, but all my parabatai runes burn 24/7 so I don't feel the burning touch of his stele. "We're running out of time."

I open my mouth to calm him down, probably to say that it's not his fault if I don't get better, if I end up being an empty shell; but I don't even get the chance to do it.

"What are _you two_ doing?" Jasper asks suspiciously, making both me and Leo jump.

"I could ask you the same question. Is knocking on the door a new concept to you?" Leo makes his best indignant expression. "We could be naked!" A chill passes through me the moment he says it.

"Naked? She's your parabatai, Leo. What would she be doing naked in front of you?"

"So you're okay with me being naked in front of her as long as she's dressed up?" I swear I don't know how these two haven't killed each other yet.

Jas is about to answer but I stop him.

"Save your bullshit, you two! No one's getting naked in front of no one." Noticing that Leo's still got a hand in my waist I pull away. He doesn't seem to notice.

"You sure? Not many women can say they had the same offer of seeing the miracle of nature that I am on the same terms that it came to this world, and you're denying it?" He looks offended, but I know better than to believe his acting.

"Knowing you as I know, you were probably born as a ninja turtle, so yes, I'm denying it." I snap, ending our conversation as I leave the training room. Not two minutes later I have Jas and Leo on each side of me. I feel them exchanging one of their silent conversations behind me.

"Drake said dinner would be late." Jas breaks the silence.

"He did, huh?" I ask, suspiciously. Dinner is _always _late.

"Yep." I'd put my hands on fire to say that his lack of explanations are hiding something.

"And did he say why?" We reached my bedroom door so I stop walking and turn around to look at them. Leo's already casually lying against the wall, as if he didn't have a care in the world. I wish I could remember how much of that acting is truth. For some reason I think _I should _know.

"He said he had somewhere to go and that he'd bring food on his way back home." Jas shrugs, but instead of calming me down, he only makes the tension on his shoulders more noticeable.

I nod and open the door, shooting them one last look before I actually enter my bedroom and closing the door. My bed is still unmade and the book piles lying against the wall are still untouched, meaning that Leo hasn't been reading from my books lately – well Jas told me that he hasn't even touched them since the attack, so I don't know why I still expect him to.

I run to my bedside table, looking for my stele. A few moments later I'm drawing a hearing rune on my right arm. I've always found it weird that it actually looks like an earlobe. I feel the burning touch as I finish the rune and dump the stele on my bed just to leave the room once more.

Once I'm outside I don't need to think to know they're on Jas's bedroom – no one goes inside Leo's room. Personally, I don't even know where his bedroom is, if he actually has one. I wonder if I ever did.

In either way, it's quite a run, as Drake adopted the girls-for-one-side-boys-for-the-other rule on the Institute.

Drake Branwell is the head of the London Institute, the one I currently inhabiting in. As far as I'm concerned, he's a cool guy; but he carries a sad look everywhere he goes. Poor guy; his parents died in battle three years ago, when he was only eighteen, leaving him in charge of the Institute.

Jas told me that Institutes don't usually pass through generations – the head must be nominated by the Clave – although, on the other hand, Leo told me that his grandfather Henry had run the Institute before his parents did. But it was the only home Drake had ever known, so when he applied for the job the Council led him the Institute.

After Valentine not too many people want to become responsible for something as important as an Institute, they say it's too dangerous. I guess if it wasn't for Drake the three of us would be homeless at the best option – dead, at the worst.

I reach Jas's bedroom door and back my ear against the key hole.

"... she'll take it? She's scared! You know that! I'm supposed to help her. But I can't give her memories she never shared with us! I'm her parabatai goddamn! I should be _doing_ something!" I hear Leo hitting something really hard and I feel sorry for Jas's furniture. About the memories I've never shared with them; apparently I haven't told them anything about my life before I met them. Sometimes I think that if they were that bad, maybe I'm better this way.

"Magnus is helping us. Drake went down to the faeries see if he can get something. The werewolves and vampires are searching. There's nothing we can do that they can't, Leonard!" Jas's words are useless, but I'm too shocked to do react.

"Downworlders! All of them! How can we be sure that they're not the ones behind this?!" Another sound and I pray that Drake keeps some hidden safe with money or else the only thing that will be left on Jas's room will be his mattress. "If Magnus can't invoke this demon it's because it's something else. Someone's controlling the thing and you know it!"

"Leo! This demon didn't only affect us and you know it! There have been deaths all over the country – Downworlders deaths inclusive!"

I pull away from the door, not able to listen to it any longer. They've been trying to track down the demon that attacked me in secret. I hear steps and hide behind the closest door – well technically that would be Jas's bedroom door, so I hide behind the second closest door.

"I'm sorry, Jas. You just... don't understand." I hear Leo's voice saying. He sounds tired, as if they'd had this argument before, which I'm starting to think they actually did.

"Leo!" Jas shouts, but I can hear Leo's steps walking away. Then Jas's door shuts close. I swear that if Jas's bedroom still exists within a year I'll believe that I'm actually a descendent of an Angel.

Once there's no other sound to hear other than the owls outside, I get out of my hiding place and start making my way back to my bedroom.

"Did no one ever tell you that it isn't polite to be nosy?" I nearly jump out of my skin as Leo gets out of the shadows to join me.

"Yeah, because I have nothing else to do than to hear you talking about the beauty of nature that you are." I say, straining to keep my voice steady, but wondering what gave me away.

"And –" Leo gets his voice ready to do what I know will be his impression of someone – I've figured that that someone is usually me. " 'I'm the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. It's awful. If I'm on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where I'm going, I'm liable to say I'm going to the opera. It's terrible.' "

"Oh don't you Catcher In The Rye on me!" I try to keep a mad look, but I end up smiling. I didn't need to think to remember this quote. It came out naturally. As natural as Leo came to this world.

He can't help himself but to smile as well. However it's a smile that doesn't last longer than our walk until my bedroom.

I put my hand on the door's handle when we reach it, but Leo grabs me by the arm. I look up to him and I find him staring right back into my green eyes. And it's in moments like this that I find it harder to forget how beautiful he is, with his half curled half straight brown hair and his light blue eyes that have a tip of orange in the centre. It's hard to cool the fire that his eyes torch in me and remember that I'm his parabatai and not one of the many suitors I know he has.

Then he breaks the fire as he looks down, allowing me to breathe again.

"I wanted to tell you, Emma. I did. But they didn't let me." He apologizes. I almost laugh.

"And since when do you do what you're told?" I don't say it in a mean way, is just a fact, but when he answers me, he does it in a murmur.

"Since they told me they'd send you away if I did." I hold my breath for while, panicking inside, but then I let my air out. They can't separate parabatai. The Law doesn't aloud it.

I give him an "I-understand" look and turn around. He grabs me by the arm once more. And once more, I look up to meet his eyes.

"What's a ninja turtle?" He asks making me laugh, but all I can think inside is 'I don't remember.'

I turn around once more and this time I know he won't grab my arm again. I don't close the door either. As my parabatai, I can't keep secrets from him, although Leo is kind enough not to force me into awkward situations.

I hear him putting his hand on the door handle.

"Oh, and just in case." I turn around to face him. "If you feel like not going to hear me talking about the beauty of nature that I am again, don't forget to put a silent rune." He winks at me before closing the door.

**A/N: **Alright, I know this is by far not as good as Cassandra Clare's books, but I tried! So please review it and tell me if it's worth it to keep up with it :D

Best, Is.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

_The only thing that tells me I'm still alive is the pain. The burning and unstoppable pain I feel all over my body, but essentially on my head. And I feel it for hours and hours. I pray for it to fade but it doesn't. I pray to die, but I don't either. Or is death like this? A black room full of pain that you can't escape from?_

_It feels like I've been in the room of death for days, perhaps years, before I start to hear it._

"_Emma, c'mon! C'mon! You have to wake up. It'll get better! I promise." The voice doesn't ring a bell, and neither does the name. Who's Emma? Is it possible that _I am _Emma? If so, of course I had to have such an ordinary name._

_I don't wake up though, and the voice fades. I almost hope the pain will go with it, but seems to refuse to do as I ask. So it's me and the pain, for a few more hours. Then days, months, years... Who can tell really? Not me for sure._

"_She's trembling." Am I? "She's starting to sense us. You sure you want to do this. I can-" The same voice again, but this time a second voice interrupts the first one._

"_I'm sure." It's all it says. Fast and barely a sound even. But I feel myself reaching for it. Reaching for that second voice._

_That's when the pain loosens. Not much, but after so much time feeling it, I can tell the difference. However, that seems to be the only difference. I'm still inside the dark room with no walls. The room of death. Did I hear the Devil and the Angel talking? Was that it? Was I reaching for the Angel? It sure seemed like the voice of an Angel. But then, the Devil seemed to care too much for what'd happen, which doesn't match._

_More waiting – this time not so long, but equally painful. Then, I finally start to _feel _something other than the pain. I feel sweaty and weak. I feel hands – one in my arm and another below my hand. Hands that let go of me as they lay me on the floor. Or is it a coffin? Is this my funeral?_

_I strain to get control of my body and open my eyes. And as so as take a look I close them again. Fire. There's fire everywhere. A blue fire. _

"_Emma Herondale?" A voice speaks from _inside _my brain, nearly making me jump, but I have no strength. "Your parabatai ceremony is taking place at this moment. We need your cooperation." With every word of this new voice my head hurts even more, but at the same time, it's keeping me here – away from the room of death._

_Once more, I open my eyes. The fire is still there, but this I can see that it's arranged in circles. I'm lying in the centre of one of them and in the centre of the other is a boy. He has his back turned to me so all I can say is that he's thin, but muscled and that his hair is brown._

"_The girl is aware of what's going on. The ceremony must begin." The voice speaks in my head, but I have the feeling that this time it's not _only _in my head, as the boy in the other circle turns to me. _

_For a moment we stare at each other. I examine his beautiful blue eyes and the tiny scar above his left eyebrow that the blue fire allows me to see. His lips are pinched as though he's in pain and I wonder if he'd been on his dark room too. I'm almost sure he'll start crying, but then he turns away, abruptly. _

"_According to the delicate conditions we're in, the parabatai ceremony that will take place today is an exception. Being this way, it has been decided that it isn't necessary to read the usual holy words from the Codex." The voice in my head sounds annoyed as though even though we're doing it – whatever this para-whatever ceremony is – the owner voice doesn't agree with it. I can't see much behind the fire, as I'm still lying on the cold floor, so I can't tell where the voice comes from, or _what _can project it in this inhuman way._

"_One of you must step inside the other's circle and say the words Raziel thought us. Then you draw the runes." Instructions seem to be clear, there's only the thing that (1) I can't even stand up, less else step on the other circle; (2) I have no clue who Raziel is and I'm sure he thought me no words; (3) runes?!_

_Despite all this, the boy steps in my fire circle – I hold my breath in the exact moment he crosses the fire line, afraid he'll get burnt. But he doesn't even seem to notice the fire. He crouches next to me and takes my arm and my hand. My skin burns where he touches me and I wonder if it has anything to do with this freaky ceremony. For some reason, I don't feel freaked out or anything even though I know I should be. I simply feel tired and confused. I tell myself this is nothing but a big dream after I had a though day of school – perhaps I even hit with my head and that'd explain the endless pain._

_Carefully the boy gets to his knees at the same time he moves me, making me sort of sit with whole weight resting against him._

"_Repeat my words." He starts speaking words he obviously knows from heart and makes pauses between the verses so I can repeat them. They're quite confusing, so I have to focus._

Whiter thou goest, I will go;  
Where though diest, will I die  
And there will I be buried  
The Angel do so to me, and more also,  
If aught but death part thee and me.

_It's obviously and ancient language, almost as if we weren't speaking English, and I'm positive some of the words I said don't even exist, but I didn't struggle. I did as I'd been told._

_Then everything goes silence. And I think of the words I just said – almost a love declaration if you think of it. But our situation is all but romantic._

_The boy takes a shine cylinder out of his pocket and runs it over my arm, as though he's drawing. His touch his soft and pondered. I feel a burning pinch when he finishes what must be a rune. But he doesn't stop there; he draws one more, making me feel the burning touch pinch once again._

_Then he lends me the cylinder and I look at him blankly. "Just repeat the word parabatai over and over again in your head, and let your hands do the rest." He whispers. His voice his kind, but sad and angry too. I wonder how that can be. _

_I take the cylinder and exam in for a second. It's lighter than I thought, and has a big C on one side and a castle on the other. I look up to his, still not sure what to do or how to draw the forms he so securely drew on my arm. He nods to me._

_I repeat the word in my head as I touch his arm with the strange cylinder. To my own surprise, my hands start moving and the runes appear on his arm._

"_Emma Herondale and Leonard Carstairs you are now parabatai." With these not really spoken words, the fire disappears and I hear someone running in our direction. I can't see who it is in this sudden dark, but I feel the boy that's still holding me taking the cylinder back from me just to run it through the back of my neck._

_Once I feel the pinch I black out again, with my last vision being the image of the blonde hair and the golden eyes of the boy who just joined us._

I wake up covered in sweat. Everything I just saw is still very alive in my head as though I've just been through it. Somehow I've manage to re-live my parabatai ceremony in the past few hours.

I stand up, still fully dressed for dinner, and look at myself in the mirror wall. The first thing I look for is the corner of my memory rune that is the only part I can see in the mirror, and when I see that it's still there I let out a breath. I've been doing this every day since the first time it faded and I forgot who I was. Leo had to do it again, after he managed to calm me down when he found me sitting on the swing of a playground at two in the morning.

"You do know that it doesn't matter how long you look at yourself in the mirror you'll never be as beautiful as I am, don't you?" On my rush of reaching the mirror, I totally missed Leo sitting on my window sill. The moonlight makes his hair greyish and I wonder how he'll be when he gets to his sixties – of course that might not even be a chance. Being a Shadowhunter doesn't exactly give you a long live expectation.

"What are you doing here?" I ask. Sighing as I sit back on my bed.

"You missed dinner. I came to look for you and found this." He puts up my writing book. I know what he means. That book has only one poem on it. Since I came back I hadn't been able to write anything else. My hand and my mind just seem to be stuck in the same words.

"Give me that." I say, standing up and trying to take it back from him. But even sitting on the window sill, he's taller than me. So he puts his arms up along with my notebook and read from it.

"_Once a saviour, once a warrior. Now a traitor, worth to pray for?" _He gives me the notebook and I sigh as I take it. "What does it mean?" He actually seems concerned.

I go back to bed, and surprisingly he follows me, except I lay below the cover while he lies over them.

"I don't know." I say, not really up to talk about it. "I think it has something to do with my past, but I'm not sure."

We both fall into a deep silence. I turn around, facing the piles of books in my room, and look for one in specific. On the third pile from the right and the sixth book if you start counting from below, there's my copy of the _Codex_. I've been wanting to read it again since I lost my memory, but I'm afraid it might say something like 'if you're attacked by the memory-eating demon, you might as well kill yourself, unless you want to live the rest of your miserable life making other people suffer because of the piece of crap that you became (if you weren't already). Compliments, Raziel'.

"'Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning.'" Leo says, getting me away from my own thoughts and obviously quoting something. "So what were you dreaming of? What woke you up?"

For a brief second a battle takes place in my mind. Lie or tell truth? Even though I haven't dreamed of anything he doesn't know of, I remember his sad expression during the whole ceremony. Lie, I decide.

"Of your coffin." I say.

For a moment I think he has no answer for my joke – which would be a first time – but then he answers back.

"How sweet of you! Already making sure I'll have a comfortable place to rest forever. Bet it was made of gold." He says, and then starts describing how he planned that he's coffin should be. _Who the hell plans that at seventeen?!_

Somewhere between the leather jeans and cowboy boots of Leo's description, I fall back asleep.

**A/N: Hmm, yeah. Idk. Review it, maybe?  
Best, Is. **


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Have I ever mentioned that sleeping in the Institute is probably the hardest mission you could be given?

I nearly fall from my bed as the sound of the door bell wakes me up. By door bell what I actually mean is the huge rusty metal bell that must weight around a ton and it's casually hanged on the highest room of the Institute. Every Shadowhunter Institute used to be a church back in time because we need the whole holy ground thingy to keep the vampires away. Oh, yeah, another thing I haven't mentioned, I don't simply deal with Demons, there are also vampires and werewolves and warlocks. And who'd guess, worst of all: faeries. At least, that's what Drake says every time he has to go "down there".

I think at some point the old me must have met, or at least seen, one of each of these, but now I have no clue what they look like, I just know they're real.

I get up and notice that the door's still opened, which tells me that Leo just left. Dressed with a white T-shirt and some tight black jeans I had put up yesterday for dinner, I leave the room as well.

As soon as I enter the too cold when compared to my bedroom hallway, I hear noise downstairs. I'm about to start running towards the noise when a tall blonde figure nearly breaks all of my bones as he makes me fall to the floor – the boy who was the last vision of my dream.

"Thanks a lot Jas," I say, as I rub my hands on each other, trying to ease the pain. Jasper helps me up to my feet.

"I was looking for you." He says, as though I couldn't tell. One does not simply run into the girls' hallway where only I inhabit if he's not looking for me. I raise my eyebrows to him, as though saying 'go on', but he never gets the chance to do it.

Without me noticing it, the noise had stopped downstairs and I was now able to hear steps coming in our direction. Some I recognized, some, I didn't. Jas moves away, now standing by my side and allowing me to have a clear vision of the hallway. That's when I see them turning the corner. I bite my tongue as I almost jump with the unexpected and not so welcomed view.

Coming towards us is a tall figure whose face has been changed to a point that it became unrecognizable – inhuman even. Lips always pressed together, with surgical stitches uniting the upper part and the bottom part of them, and the eyes are empty balls. His skin is white as paper and it's covered with runes the colour of dried blood. One of the most terrifying visions I've ever had and that I've only heard about since the attack – a Silent Brother.

Following the Silent Brother are Drake and Leo, the first looking quite annoyed while the second seems completely infuriated.

I feel Jas's hand carefully taking my elbow as though telling me to be careful as the three of them stop a few steps away from us.

"Emma, this is Brother Jorah. He came here to check on you." Drake says to me.

"I'm fine, thank you." I say, keeping my voice neutral and staring right at Brother Jorah's "eyes" as I speak, but looking away as soon as I shut.

"_Actually I came to check on Miss Herondale and Mr. Carstairs. As you know, they still need to have their six-month evaluation._" We do?

"Emma is not ready yet. She's still learning how to fight." Leo speaks for me. "We told you we'd warn you when we were ready."

"_This has been delayed long enough. I'm sure Miss Herondale will understand if we assure her that we'll take her _condition _in consideration._ _We don't want to keep her prisoner here forever do we?_"

My eyes meet Leo's blue eyes immediately. _Are they forcing you to keeping me here? _I know I still hesitate whenever I'm told to use a weapon, Leo complains about it every day, yet once I have it in my hands; I become one of the best. Drake says it's in my blood. Apparently his ancestors were friends with mine. Leo looks away without answering me.

"I understand." I say, not really sure about how I managed to let the words out – I can feel my legs trembling slightly. As far as I'm concerned, the Silent Brothers can read anyone's mind and bring a man to his knees just by causing pain in his brain.

Leo looks back at me, this time cursing me with his eyes. I can tell that the Silent Brother is about to speak once more when the bell – the door bell – gives the sign of a break in – which is really just unstoppable noise that makes you want to cover your ears using a pillow. But unfortunately that's not an option. We all reach for our weapons, except of course, I don't have any with me. I even left my stele somewhere in my bed, probably between the sheets.

Jas pushes me back, nearly making me fall again, as Drake and Leo rush downstairs, the first carrying a seraphic blade and the second carrying a simple dagger. Leo prefers smaller weapons, a habit I got from him. He said that the old Emma preferred bow and arrows better but to be honest, I haven't tried those yet since the attack. I feel like if I don't get along with them anymore, it means that I'm not Emma anymore. I'm a stranger. Even though I'm not really sure what the old Emma was like.

The Silent Brother doesn't move. He stands there as the minutes of silence struck us hard with panic. I wonder if he can hear my heart beating against my ribs as a hammer would and so fast as a fox could run.

The silence last while longer but then all of a sudden the shouting starts.

"Of course you couldn't just ring? Or, I don't know, text? Isn't that what you do with those metallic things of yours?" Drake shouts as he, Leo and someone else I've never seen before appear at the end of our hallway.

"It's called a _cell phone_." The new visitor says, sounding both bored and enthusiastic at the same time. I can tell he's not British because he has no accent, but he's not American either, although he could pass by one.

The man is young, I'd say around his twenties, but the way he dresses is what startles me. He's clothes sparkle and I can tell that he is wearing a tank top made of dark blue sequins that reflects the sun light. Fortunately his jeans are black, or else I'm not sure how one could look at him directly. His converse are bright blue though.

They approach a few more steps and that's when I see them – just below his dark hair and above his white smile – the cat's eyes. Magnus Bane warlock unique mark.

"Magnus!" Jas exclaims, calming down instantly as he recognizes him too.

I've been told that warlocks always have a birth mark that distinguishes them from other people – from humans. They can be born with tails, different skin tones or even elf ears. But now, looking at Magnus smiling as he shakes hands with Jas, I see human – a sad human though, I can tell. How can this sensitive yet kind being be the descendent of a demon?

"You must be Emma." Magnus says, as he turns to face me. His golden, weird yet beautiful, cat's eyes evaluating me. I nod to him.

"_I didn't know you allowed warlocks in the institute."_ Brother Jorah says, obviously not happy.

"Perhaps you haven't noticed, but we didn't exactly _allow _him in." Leo points out. Brother Jorah ignores him.

"_In any case, I have what I came here for. The Clave will be sending an evaluator soon. Meanwhile I hope you keep the girl... safe." _He finishes, having one last look at each one of us, if you can say that he was actually having a look, before he turns around on his feet and starts walking. Drake glances one last time at Magnus, furiously, before he follows brother Jorah.

They all relax at the same time, but I keep my defensive posture. The Silent Brother is right. What is a warlock doing in our Institute?

"Weren't you in New York?" Leo asks casually has he enters my bedroom as though it is his. I follow him instantly, not really feeling okay with the thought that three boys are entering my bedroom - that's still in the same state I left it after I jumped out of bed -, one of which is dressed like a girl.

"Yeah, but it seems that Shadow Hunters there aren't as kind as in here." Magnus says, letting himself fall in the bed and suddenly look a few hundred years older. I wonder what his real age is.

"Still having problems with your ex?" Jas asks, actually looking concerned. I didn't know Magnus had a girlfriend, but then, although I've heard a lot about him, I've just met him.

Jas told me that Magnus loves to say that he hates Shadow Hunters, yet he's always helping them.

"Does the word _ex _mean anything for you, Jasper? You can't have problems with someone you no longer care about." Magnus says, standing up and sighs. All I can think is 'right on the feelings, Jas'.

Leo, who managed to stuff his nose on my copy of "The General on His Labyrinth" already, interrupts them.

"So are you going to tell us something useful, like that you've _finally _found the god damn demon-"

"Leonard!" Jas cuts him, looking at me carefully.

"It's okay. She knows we've been searching." Leo shrugs.

"She knows?!" Now he's moving his eyes from me, to Leo, then back to me, successively.

I'm reading to apologize for having been eavesdropping when Leo speaks up for me.

"I told her." Once more, he shrugs, but I can tell that he's a little tense. He cares about what Jas thinks of him. "It slipped."

Jas sighs.

"Well, at least now we can all talk open to each others. But you still have to be careful with Drake. If he knows about this, he'll send you to spend a for-life holiday with the Iron Sisters."

I open my mouth to ask who the Iron Sisters are but I have no time. Leo seems to be on a cutting people's words day.

"They're the female version of the Silent Brothers." Suddenly a chill passes through my spine. "Yeah..." He says.

"I'll be careful." I say, just to calm Jas down.

"As I was saying, Magnus, is there any special reason you came here for, or did you just come to cry over your love problems? Because if so, I found this blind date site that I'd like to try out and they're not very... prejudiced, if you know what I mean. Although I think you should put illusionist on your job description instead of Downworlder warlock, as it might actually scare your matches away."

I hope that Magnus gets more of Leo's speech than I do, because the only part of it that I understand is _blind date_ and I instinctively turn my hand into a fist when I hear it.

"No. I did not come here to talk about my love problems, much less with you. And unfortunately I haven't found your demon either." As Magnus says this he looks at me with an apologetic look, to which I respond my nodding, saying that it's okay. I'm not sure I want him to if it means it'll take one of my friends' memories as it did with mine.

"Then what are you here for?" Leo asks, stuffing his nose back in my books, as though the conversation had just lost all of its interest.

"Well, what you really want is her memory back isn't it?" Magnus asks.

"Yes." Leo looks up, suspiciously, although he doesn't close the book.

"Then I have a solution for you." Magnus makes a fast move with his hands and a small post card appears in his hands. I feel my mouth slightly opened and I force myself to close it.

"What's that?" Jas asks.

"See for yourself." Magnus passes him the post card, which I see that it's not a post card but an invitation to some sort of event.

Jas reads it for a few seconds.

"Of course!" He exclaims. "All this time we've been asking for the wrong thing when it was as simple as that."

I raise my eyebrows, confused. But apparently I'm not the only one.

"Will you stop saying meaningless words and tell us what's on the damn invitation?" Leo asks, having put the book back on its pile.

"It's from the faeries." Jas says, smiling as he shows the invitation to Leo. "Looks like we're going to a party!"

**A/N: Hey. Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Final weeks of school have been quite hard. But I hope you have enjoyed this new chapter. Could you please review my story? If so, thank you.**

**Best, Is.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

"Definitely not happening! You're not going there!" Leo nearly shouts at me for what must be the thirtieth time. I lost count around the twelfth time. "Whatever Queen Seelie has to say she can say it to me. There's no need for you to endanger yourself."

"Well, as far as I'm concerned, I still have the right of making my own decisions," I say.

"Not if I tie you to the bed!" Leo persists but I ignore him.

"_Plus_," I continue as if he hadn't spoken, "We both know she'll tell you nothing. She'll want something in return from _my _memories and that something will have to come from _me._" I argue, making Leo sigh in frustration.

Magnus and Jasper are both sitting, the first in my bed and the second on my clothes' chair – Jas started by sitting on the bed, but his butt ended up meeting my stele which I had carelessly left between the sheets, so he ended up sitting on the chair and rubbing his buttock every once in a while. They've been quietly watching me and Leo arguing for over forty minutes now.

Basically, after Magnus showed us the invitation and Jas explained me that Queen Seelie, AKA the Queen of Faeries, AKA the master of using the truth to tell you lies, knows everything, like literally everything, that happens on planet Earth, including the all the No-Mortals-Allowed realms such as Alicante, where supposedly all Shadowhunters come from and where Raziel first appeared with the Mortal Instruments.

So the plan, suggested by Magnus and completed by the rest of us, was that we'd snuck in in the faeries party – that's where Magnus would help us and I'll be indebted to him for the rest of my days – and then we'd somehow force our way to the Queen and get her to give me my memories back using her magical powers or her demon fairy pox or by waving a wand. I don't know, and I don't really care, as long as I have what I want. But of course, it wouldn't be that easy. We'd have to give something in return – _I'd _have to give her something in return. What that something will be, no one knows.

But when I said, and I'm quoting, "I'm in." Leo decided that his whole _we _included only Jas, Magnus and himself. That's about when the argument started.

"You two babies are done with your crying?" Magnus says, obviously bored with all of this – I wonder why does he even bother to hear our lamentations and arguments or even to help us. What have we done for him?

Both I and Leo open our mouths to complain but Magnus raises his eyebrows to us, and we immediately close our mouths shut.

"She's right. Seelie will want her there or else there'll be no deal." Magnus says. "Although," and now he's speaking directly to me, "due to your lack of let's say, experience, Leo will be on charge. Which means that if he tells you to abort mission, or even to dance like a chicken around him, you'll do so." This time, I was the one to arch my eyebrows to him, but I said nothing. I simply nodded, telling him I'd do as he said.

Magnus then smiled, satisfied, although he knew neither of us – Leo and I – were happy with the agreement. I mean, we were going to get my memories, _I should _be the one in charge.

"Anything to add my fellow Jasper?" Magnus said.

Jas, who apparently had been lost on his inner thoughts shakes his head no.

"Alright. I'll see you all at seven thirty then. How you'll get away from your rude guardian it's not my problem though, so I suggest you start thinking about it and fast." Then he disappears into nothing - which startles me as I had no idea he could do that without opening a portal - and leaving a dress on his place. Did I not mention that Queen I-Have-Wings is a little dramatic? My theory: it's an old immortal people thing. Anyway, the party will be inspired on the 1800's so I'll actually have to wear a dress.

I pick up the dress from the floor and start to check it out when I hear the door shut close with too much strength, making me jump; and I don't need to look up to know that Leo just left. The dress confirmed that I was really going, something he was obviously still trying to stop from happening.

I shrug to myself saying that it's not worth to rely on it and let the dress fall on the bed, trying not to get it creased or folded, aware that it's both still too soon for me to get dress but also the impossibility to try the dress on because Jas is still sitting on my chair, obviously abstracted from the fact that both Magnus and Leo have already left.

I stare at him for a few seconds before I call him back to reality. His blonde hair is still messy as he probably came running towards my bedroom right after he woke up. I wonder how my own hair must look like and I feel an urge of combing it with my hands, but it's really no use now. Jas is the kind of guy who's pretty quiet when his best friend is not around but I've never seen him _this _quiet.

"Jas?" I call out.

He looks around confused. "Huh? What? Where's everyone?" He asks, standing up immediately.

"Left about five minutes ago. You didn't lose much though." I say.

Jas looks at me, as though he was embarrassed. I decided I might as well save him and change the subject.

"Jas," I start, not really sure how I want to put things so I end up saying something like this: "Why does Magnus dress like a bad female super model?"

Jas expression changes to surprise for a split second but then he bursts into laughing. I wait for him to control himself.

"Well," he says, still giggling a little, "in case you haven't noticed, Magnus is… _gay._" He becomes serious as he says the word 'gay'; almost in awe.

I shake my head, confused.

"So are you. And I've never seen you dressed like a girl, unless you're wearing lingerie which I seriously hope you are not, are you?" I say, smiling to him.

But neither does he smile back nor answers my question.

"You know." He says, talking to himself. "How?"

I sigh. Do guys really don't get how obvious they are?

"You've been living with Leo for too many years and you're not his parabatai. What other explanation could there be?" That's really not how I knew. I've noticed the way Jas gets whenever Leo talks about girls. The way he tenses up. The way his smile fades. The way his eyes reflect jealousy whenever Leo flirts with me – that's sort of the bad part of being the only girl in the Institute: you're over protected from outsider guys, but the constant target of the insider show off.

"Please don't tell him." He nearly begs me.

I hesitate trying to decide whether to let him make his own choices or to advise him.

"And that's how the world becomes a place of promises and liars." I end up saying not to him in particular but agreeing that I wouldn't tell.

In order for our plan to succeed one of us had to stay behind to fool Drake. Jas took that place. I could tell he wasn't happy to stay behind but it's one for the team, right?

So at six thirty in the noon I was struggling with my dark green dress. It was supposed to emphasize the colour of my bright green eyes but all it had emphasized so far was my clumsiness on what comes to being girly. I ended up by texting Jas 'SOS' so he could help me zipping it – I wasn't going to risk going outside my bedroom where Drake could spot me in a two hundred years old dress that I wasn't supposed to have, much less be wearing to go to a party.

After I was inside the dress I went for the hair. That one could have gone much worse. Using a curling hair iron I managed to get what appeared to be natural curls that I then pulled up using some hair pins. It had to be enough.

I had twenty minutes left to put on some make-up – something I've never done before, at least not since the attack. I must have worn it before or else I wouldn't even own a make-up set. I looked at the greens' section but the colours seemed all too bright to match my dress, so I figured I'd use some golden eye shadow – same colour as my delicate sandals - and then draw a thin line of bright green right above my eye lashes and below the golden.

Right when I was putting the lip gloss back in its case I hear the knock on my bathroom door – Leo made no ceremony when it came to enter my bedroom but he never entered the bathroom without my permission.

I don't waste time telling him to come it. It's time to go and we had no time to waste. At this exact moment Jas should be taking Drake to the weaponry because of some "stolen" seraphic blades – which were the same I and Leo would be taking to the party.

Rule number one of a Shadowhunter: never leave the Institute without at least twenty weapons even if they're heavier than you.

Rule number two: don't let your opponents see your weapons. That's why mine are hidden on this black elastic I have around my thigh. My stele is on a secret pocket – "a nephilim's best weapon is and will always be its stele", quoted directly from the Codex.

I open the door and find myself looking at an angel. Leo was wearing a greyish blue suit that somehow managed both to match my dress perfectly and to highlight the orange of his eyes. They have now a colour that should be inhuman, yet I'm looking right at it.

And he was staring back at me. His mouth slightly opened as he observes me from head to toes. I figure he must be checking if I am plausible enough so I take my time to observe him as well. His runes are freshly made – Leo said he'd do mines while we were on the car, as a rune made by a parabatai is always stronger – and he looked skinnier. There were dark circles below his eyes as well and the scar above his left eye brow that I usually love, now looked bigger as if his skin had stretched.

"Shall we go?" He asks, landing me his arm. If I was expecting him to tell me I looked pretty I let myself down. But I didn't say anything about him either. I couldn't. As my parabatai he was a weapon in battle. And when we weren't in battle he was my friend. Nothing else.

I take his arm and together we make our way to the entrance, as fast as we can. Magnus was already there waiting for us. I hesitate for a second admiring the limo, but Leo urges me to go inside.

Once we're all in, I have my session of pinches as Leo draws runes all over my body, including my back, which implies that he unzips my dress and has a look at my spinal medulla and my rib cage well defined on my naked back and with no bra on the way as I'm not wearing any.

After that, we stop and I know we're there. I feel my heart beating hard against my chest and I tell it to hush, but it doesn't.

Getting inside the faeries realm is one of the strangest things I've ever done as we go in through this water fountain. It causes me some chills and a weird cold inside me, but all of it goes away as soon as I meet Magnus on the other side. Emmett comes last, right behind me.

Obviously they're waiting for us, as there is a male faerie waiting as both me and Leo follow Magnus through a dark passage way. The young 'man' doesn't present himself, he simply checks our invitation and then nods to us, allowing us to continue.

That's about when Leo grabs my hand, not in a lacing fingers hand holding. He just holds it to keep me close and aware. He leans closer fast, making my heart skip a beat with surprise.

"Do not touch any food. Much less any drink. And do not _talk _with anyone but me or Magnus until we get to the Queen. Understood?" Leo's voice has changed to his leader tone that I recognize from my practice with him when he's on a bad mood. It actually scares me a little, but I nod and he leans away, still holding on to my hand.

The noise comes in, starting low and increasing as we keep walking. Then, all of a sudden, I'm on the middle of a world of fake stars that fluctuate in the air close enough for me to reach for them. I feel tempted to do so, but I keep my hand left hand closed on a fist and my right hand holding on tight to Leo's. I feel him squeezing it, saying 'It'll be fine, as long as you behave'.

My eyes are locked on the ground as we walk so I won't call anyone's attention. My blonde hair usually does that for me, I don't need to add my lighthouse eyes to the problem.

We don't stop and I watch the pavement changing. The smell of food and alcohol, previously only slightly distinguishable before, is now intense and almost intolerable. We must be near the kitchen.

But then, a few steps forward, we stop. My heart beating faster and faster. I keep my eyes locked on the pinkish pavement as I try to calm it down.

"Em, look up." Leo says after a few seconds of silence.

And as soon as I do, I find a teasing smile looking back at me – Seelie, the Queen herself, is making fun of me. She was beautiful, I could tell, with her dark hair. But I did not came here to praise her. I had something to ask for.

"Queen Seelie," I start, wondering if I should bow for her. "I came here-"

"I know what you came here for, girl. No need to tell me." She cuts me off. "But if you're willing to talk about deals I'm all yours." She says, and her eyes flash between the three of us, focusing on Leo at last.

I stare at him for a second before I answer – even he seems to be speechless in front of the Queen.

"We are." I say.

Queen Seelie turns her eyes to me, reluctant.

"Then make your wishes and I'll shall make mine." She says, smiling again.

The attention draws over me and I dry swallow.

"I want my memories back." I say. But inside I'm thinking, _I want _me _back. _

"I want the boy." Seelie says, not hesitating for a second and I can tell she had all this planned even before I _decided _to come.

"He's not for sale," I say, my voice becoming a little offensive.

"What for?" Leo interrupts, making both I and Magnus look at him, startled. Well, I more mad than startled.

"As a servant of course." The Queen says, giggling a little as if to say that it was obvious. "And when you grow more mature you'll give me little Shadowhunters."

"And she'll have her memories back full time with no _breaks_?" He asks.

"It doesn't matter because it's _not happening._" I say.

The Queen ignores me.

"Of course." She says, getting exited now, as if she got happier the more I panicked.

"Deal." Leo says, carefully avoiding my eyes. He's muscles are tensed up and I can see the vein on his neck pulsing fast.

"NO!" I say and focus on the Queen. "I'm the one making the deal."

The Queen, who had been excitedly looking at my parabatai turns to me, sighing.

"Unfortunately you are right." She says. "But didn't you want your memories so badly you were willing to give _anything._"

"Yes, anything. Not _anyone?"_

She looks at me with a funny look, as if things were getting more and more interesting when they were really just getting me more and more pissed off.

"Are you sure? You have quite an interesting past my dear, did you know?" Then her face lights up and I'm fully aware that that's not a good sign. "In fact, let me show you."

I have no time to react before I black out.

_Everything is dark around me and I think of the dark room I inhabited for a while after the attack, but as my eyes adjust to the weak light, I see that this is not that room. There are small windows on a cement wall, from where a thin light comes inside. I try to recall what this place could be – maybe an industrial factory? –, but it's been so long since I've been outside the Institute that I no longer remember how the world outside is like._

_I hear a noise and a door opens. Two figures come inside. For what I can tell so far one is male and the other female. They walk close as they approach me._

"_Jer?" I call out. The male figure approaches me as the female stays behind. When the boy is close enough I can tell that he's pretty. Rounded face, perfect teeth, green eyes and light brown hair. Definitely a Shadowhunter – no other species could ever look that angelic. "Jer, what's going on?" I'm starting to cry out and my voice is getting hysterical. _

"_Calm down. I found someone to take care of us." He says, and then turns to let me see the woman._

_The woman is young, but older than Jeremy, she should be around twenty five while Jer was only nineteen. She was blonde and her eyes green, just like me. However she was twenty times more beautiful. I would look like a disfigured moppet next to her._

"_This is Camille. She's… _different." _Jer says._

"_Different how?" I ask._

"_Better." Camille seems to be pleased with Jeremy's answer, but further than that, Jer seems to be different too. As if he no longer had control of himself._

"_Well, I don't want to go with Camille. I want to keep looking for dad." I say, fearing the reaction my words can have on the stranger, but still keeping my voice firm._

"_Dad's gone." Jer says. "Haven't you figured that out already? He left us to the demons. He thought we're freaks."_

"_Thought?!"I ask, suddenly aware of what his words mean._

"_Camille did me a little favour in exchange for my loyalty." He says, smiling to her. She smiles back, but the difference is that her smile is far from being real, or even _looking _real._

"_YOU KILLED HIM?!" I scream. "HOW COULD YOU?!" I'm suddenly sobbing and trembling violently._

"_Emma calm down. He wasn't worth a damn, okay?" He reaches out for me but I push him away._

"_DON'T YOU TOUCH ME!" I scream, stepping backwards until I eventually hit a concrete wall. "YOU'RE A MOSNTER!"_

_I see him moving his hand quickly to his belt and taking a knife from it – I didn't know he carried weapons around. He points the knife to me and I start to sob harder and screaming. Camille suddenly turns more serious too. She moves closer to both us – inhumanly fast – and takes the knife back from Jeremy._

"_Leave her," she says. "She's not one of us. I told you this could happen." And then she walks towards the door without ever looking back._

_Jer stares at me for a while and I stare back, not really sure how I manage to keep my eyes steady on his._

"_You're no longer my sister." He spits and then follows after Camille._

_As he closes the door with a huge bang I'm left alone in the dark room again, starving and freezing._

I wake for only a few seconds to Queen Seelie's court. The back of my neck burning in pain as if someone had just pushed a knife right into it.

I had a brother.

Jer – Jeremy.

_Had._

And then I'm gone.

**A/N: Hey guys! I know it took a while to post again, I'm sorry, but I kind of made it up to you with a long chapter right? :D Hope you like it and review it.**

**Best, Is. **


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

When I feel myself coming back to the real world, I can tell that I'm lying down on a bed – most likely mine – and that the sun is coming in through the window, even before I open my eyes. What I couldn't tell do is that Drake is standing still, only the tiny vein of his neck pulsing, right next to my bed.

I nearly jump when I see him. He looks back at me as if expecting me to say something but I don't. The memories of the previous night hit me and I look around the room expecting to find Leo sitting on my window sill. So when I find out that he's not there, I jump out of bed ready to go back to the faeries realm to get him.

My heart bumping against my ribs as I make my way through the bathroom to change clothes. When I make my way back to the bedroom in order to get my stele I find that Drake as moved, only to stand in front of my bedroom door, making it impossible for me to leave without having to get past him.

"Drake, please." I say, my voice trembling. Every minute I spend here is another minute that the Queen will do whatever crazy things she had planned to do with Leo. Because I have no doubt Leo accepted the deal – he might have thought he'd be doing me a favour but if there's anything that hurts me more than not knowing who I am is losing the one that gives me a reason to be alive.

As Drake makes no intentions of moving away I try to struggle so I can get past him. Our "fight" doesn't last longer than two minutes, as he manages to hold my wrists and keep me grounded.

"Drake, you don't understand, Leo-" I beg him.

"You're right." He snaps. His voice louder than usual. "I don't understand how the two of you have no respect for me. Or maybe that I do understand, but Jasper? He's your friend! And you two involve him in your schemes, concerning and letting him take the blame?!"

"Drake… seriously. I take the blame. Now let me-"

"NO EMMA! You'll listen to me and when I think that you've learned your lesson I'll let you leave."

"I can't! I have to find Leo! Drake! THE QUEEN'S GOT HIM!" By the end of my begging, I'm shouting at him and I feel tears streaming down my face.

I can see that Drake's ready to shout back at me but then he hesitates and lets go of my wrist. I feel relief as I think that he has finally understood and he's letting me go. But when instead of moving away, he turns around in his feet and opens the door I'm aware I'm missing something.

"Come in." Drake says. "It won't do you any bad learn your lesson twice."

All I can think is '_did Drake go insane or…?' _before Leo walks in, still wearing the same clothes he had worn yesterday for the party, and I throw my arms around his neck, crying to his chest.

Leo calms me down by passing his fingers through the now unmade curls in my hair, but neither of us says a word, although I know we both want to. We need to deal with Drake first.

So when I finally let go of Leo and I turn to face Drake as I rub my eyes, I make sure to keep my mouth as shut as possible during his whole speech.

Drake shouts at us saying that we didn't own the right to be a Nephilim, that we should be ashamed of ourselves and that - and at this time he's voice softens a little – if it wasn't for my _condition _he would sent the both of us to separate cells in the Silent City for a full week so we would never think of embarrassing our species again. (Even though both I and Leo know Drake is a soft hearted man and that he'd never do such thing to us, Leo keeps quiet as well.)

Then Drake goes for the questions, such as "What were you even thinking?", "How could you do this to me? To Jasper?", but he never gave us time to answer – not that we were thinking of answering.

And then finally we all fall into a deep silence. My heart beating fast and loudly and I wonder if they can hear it beating too. But then the silence gets even louder than my heart beating and I can't take it any longer.

"I'm sorry, Drake." I say, voice barely audible. "We never meant to hurt you. We were just trying to get my memories back."

Leo doesn't say a word but he nods to me for some reason. Drake stares at the both of us for a while longer and then leaves, but not without saying, "Next time I won't be so kind. And I want both of you on the practice room within an hour." Then he's gone.

Neither I nor Leo say as word until we can no longer hear Drake's steps. And even then, before Leo can say something, I slap him.

He pulls away, rubbing his face.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR?!" He shouts as me.

"That was for, I'm quoting, 'Deal.'" I say, shrugging.

He looks at me, startled, but then shrugs too and shakes his head, as if saying 'well, there's nothing I can do now'. And that's when the serious look comes. I guess I should be waiting for it by now.

"Emma, although our plan didn't exactly work out as it was meant to, the Queen, she huh, she showed you something, didn't she? From your past I mean."

I sigh, knowing that this time lying won't solve my problem.

"She did."

"And…?" Leo asks, expectantly.

I bite my lip, thinking if there's any way I get away with it. But he's my parabatai after all isn't he?

"She showed me a memory I had from a few years before you guys found me." I say and then tell him the whole memory as I know he wanted me to.

Leo listens quietly until I finish.

"So you have a brother?" He asks. "Another Nephilim?"

By this time we're both sitting on my bed, which I've been leaving unmade for a couple of days now.

"_Had." _I say, making the point of the whole memory.

"Em…" He stars.

"No Leo. He killed my father! And he told me I no longer was his sister."

"But we could go look for him. How'd you know you haven't made your peace with him since then? And even if you haven't we could _put _some sense into him." He says, emphasizing the word 'put' which I understand by saying that he's not thinking of such a nice away of putting some sense into Jeremy.

"I haven't." I say.

"How do you know?" He insists.

"Didn't you say you found me living on the streets?" I ask and Leo nods. "Then what would I be doing alone on the streets and starving if I _had _made my peace with him?"

"I don't know, Em. There're thousands of possibilities. He could have been captured, or-"

"Captured?" I laugh. "By whom? Aliens?"

"No! By Camille, whoever that was."

"Leo, it doesn't matter. I'm dead to him, and he's dead to me. That's how it was before my memories were taken away from me and that's how it'll continue to be. Don't make me regret having told you this." I say.

He stares at me for a second, deciding if he should insist or not.

"Alright. Your call. I guess I should go change anyways." He stands up, obviously upset with the decision he was forced to make.

At that moment I make up my mind about something and when I call him out he was already in the hallway.

"What?" He says.

"This wasn't the only time," I say, wondering if I made the right decision or not.

"The only time?" He asks, confused.

"The only time I've had one of my memories back." I'm nearly whispering.

He sits back on the bed, this time a little closer to me.

"What are you talking about?"

"Two nights ago. I was dreaming of our parabatai ceremony. And it was real. What I saw, I mean. It was what happened. I'm sure."

"And when you woke up, you went to check your rune, which I had made just before you went to sleep." He's eyes lighten up. "You think that's it? You think if I make you the rune every night, every night you'll have a memory back?" He asks, clearly anxious to try.

"I don't know." I say. "I hadn't given it much of a thought." I lie. Honestly I'm afraid I might get another vision like I had in Seelie's court. That wasn't exactly pleasant. "You should go get dressed anyway."

He looks at me startled with my lack of enthusiasm, but nods and stands.

"We must try it tonight." He says.

I'm ready to protest, saying something like 'I'm tired. Maybe another night.', but he cuts me before I can say anything.

"I'll stay here, with you. The whole night. I promise."

I sigh and nod. When he's determined to do something nothing can go against him.

He leaves and I'm alone at last. I figure it must be a while until I have to go to the training room so I take out my writing book that I had hidden from Leo below my mattress.

After I pass twelve pages with the same poem written over and over again, and above the last poem, I write 'Jeremy', finally understanding the meaning of my words.

I'm about to close the writing book when I see something written on top of the thirteenth page – something I'm sure I didn't write and also that is was not there only seconds ago. I take a look at it.

Our deal is still up. For whenever you're up to take it.

I take out a pencil from my pencil case and write:

Not that it'd make the difference, but he's not mine to give you.

I'm not sure whether it'll work or not, and I wonder how did the Queen even manage to get her message to me, however, a few seconds later, another message appears on her careful calligraphy.

You have no idea of how wrong you are.

Then, all of a sudden, page thirteen goes empty again.

**A/N: Any idea what does the queen mean? ;) well take a guess and you might get it right! Please review!  
Best, Is.**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Remembering I do not own some characters and places, and definitely not surnames. Those all belong to Cassandra Clare.**

**Chapter Six**

Once more, I make my way inside the bathroom. I take out my dark skinny jeans and my whitish spring shirt that I'd just dressed half an hour ago. Then I dress up on my usual training clothes. Black leggings and an army pattern tank top.

Using one of the hair elastics I keep on my wrist 24/7 I pull up my unwashed hair into a pony tail. As soon as I'm done, I exit the bathroom.

Slowly, and as Drake told me to do, I make my way to the training room. Once I get there I'm surprised to find Jasper checking out on weapons that lay on a brand new table I'd never seen before and on the opposite side of the room, a set of three targets. I'm guessing that it's one for each one of us. At least there's no boys-for-one-side-girls-for-the-other rule in the training room. I'm able to feel Leo and Jasper's sweat when I'm beating them. And, well, most times they're able to feel my blood too.

"What's going on?" I ask. Jasper lets go of the seraphic blade he was checking out and joins me.

"No clue." He says. "Drake is keeping it all very mysterious." He rolls his eyes to me.

And talking about the devil, there he comes. At the door Drake shows up.

"I've settled everything you've asked for." He's saying, voice calm and obedient, and I wonder if brother Jorah is back. That'd explain why is everything so clean and why he's being so polite, (also known as, so not Drake).

But it's not brother Jorah who follows Drake inside. For as surprising as it must sound, it's a _woman. _Since when is Drake even capable of speaking to woman directly? Because I've never seen him doing so, except if such woman is from the Clave, which pretty much turns a man off instantly.

The new woman is dressed in black so I'm able to tell she's a Shadowhunter. First thing I think about this woman when she steps in the light is that she's _beautiful_. Why do I think so? She's everything I'm not. She's tall. (Well I'm not _that _short myself but I'm definitely not as tall as she is.) Her skin his tam and her hair is composed by beautiful brown curls. Her eyes are what I'd call honey colour – not quite brown, not inhuman golden either, but an outstanding in between.

She looks around the room, then fixates her look on me and Jasper for a moment, memorising us from head to feet, then turns to Drake again.

"Didn't you say there were three of them?" She asks.

Drake nods.

"Leo is missing. He can be rather disobedient…" He shakes his head in disapproval as he says the word 'disobedient'.

"He went to change his clothes. His probably-" I'm about to say 'still in his bedroom', but such room was never proved to exist, so I correct myself. "His probably on his way." I feel like it's my duty to stand for him.

"Yeah, I did see him in the hallway on my way here." Jas helps me up, although I can tell he's lying.

"Well thank the Angel. At least we know he's in the Institute and not out there doing only Raziel knows what." Drake says.

And when you talk about the devil, he comes for dinner. That's something Drake usually says when you're talking about someone and that person suddenly appears at you sight. And as soon as we all shut, Leo walks inside.

He takes a few steps into the room and all of a sudden he seems to be paralyzed. He's looking at Drake and the woman by his side. A cocky smile suddenly crosses his face and I'm sure he's up to no good.

And the bomb drops:

"She looked like the kind of woman I could fall in love with. Trouble is, she was standing next to the kind of woman I'd like to make love to." Leo had turned his eyes to me and Jasper midsentence.

My hands turned to fists and I felt anger suddenly threatening to consume me, the woman's eyebrows arched and Jas let out a small exclamation. Only Drake sighed calmly, knowing better than to give importance to Leo's deliriums. Except, to the opposite of what most people might think, Leo was not giving us his usual bullshit. No. When Leo quotes, I know he's telling the truth. No matter how distorted it might be – although this one seemed pretty clear to me.

"I see it's the first time you've heard this, or else you all wouldn't look so surprised." Leo makes his way to us calmly and stops by Jasper's side. "It's kind of a shame you know. It's a great book. Bet not even you, Emma, can guess this one." He provokes me, as if his words weren't enough.

I keep quiet.

Jas comes on my rescue.

"Were you going to present us your friend?" He asks Drake.

Drake looks at Leo before speaking, as though trying to make sure if he doesn't want to quote a song now. The last doesn't seem too interested. In fact, he has already moved and is now checking on the weapons.

"Indeed I was." Drake says. And I notice that he's not confirming that the woman is a friend of his. "This is Beatriz Gladstone. She's the one who's going to evaluate you."

Even Leo stops pretending he's focused on the whip he's holding and stares at Drake blankly.

"Evaluate whom?" He asks.

"You and Emily. As brother Jorah told you, they'd be sending someone to proceed to your six months evaluation." That explains why Drake talks to the woman.

"And what am I doing here then?" Jas intervenes. A plausible question though.

"The Clave thought that you could all receive some training as well. As I've never really provided you a decent teacher." Drake seems sort of bored with the whole thing, but when it comes to the Clave, there's not much you can do.

With this, Drake nods to Beatriz and leaves. I wonder what he does all that time he spends alone. Sometimes I imagine him baking pink cupcakes on a hidden stove he has on his chamber.

Our new trainer wastes no time with talking. She tells us to pick our weapons and let her know what we're capable of. Both I and Leo go for the daggers, so our hands touch when we choose the same one. Furiously, I move my hand and wait for him to take the dagger, picking another one – a bigger one, which I will have more trouble making fit my hand. Jas gets a seraphic blade. He's the kind to prefer close combat, while I and Leo can vary as daggers can be thrown.

Soon enough, I'm fighting against Jas, while Beatriz "evaluates" Leo. It all just seems like a "which one of us can put our hands on the other one's body more times" contest to me. Which only makes me angrier and distracted, ending up with Jas accidently inflicting me a large cut on my tight.

"I'm so sorry." He apologizes immediately. "I swear I thought you were going to defend that." He puts his hand on his back jeans pocket, reaching for his stele but he never gets to take it back.

"No." Beatriz stops him. Leo and she had stopped their fighting to see what had happened. "No healing till lunch time. You're hurt, you deal with the pain. If you can't deal with the pain, you're out for the day." She says, staring down at me sitting on the soft gymnastics mattress Jas and I were using as our fighting arena.

I pinch my lips, stopping myself from complaining. She was testing me, and I knew that at the first chance I'd give her, she would ruin me. That's what them all do, and I have a feeling that this one specially.

Don't ask me why I hated this woman so much after I just met her. But the way Leo looked at her, she couldn't be trusted. Leo has that kind of aptness to pick women.

"You're up next." She tells me. "You two can go train some bow and arrow." She points her chin to the targets.

Leo and Jas obey instantly whereas I have to strain to get on my feet and follow her.

Her weapons is the whip Leo was holding just before Drake left, which means she has more control on distant attacks but I'm faster on close combat. She counts to three and our combat starts. I'm expecting her to start hard on me, but she doesn't. She uses the whip to make me move backwards, in order to get control of the situation and be able to observe me. To know my measures. To search for flaws.

Meanwhile, I try to get closer. My movements are calculated, as I don't know my opponent either, plus my leg is now walking through the highways of hell while rivers of blood flood through my legs, soaking my Converse.

Seeing no other option I try a fast move with the dagger, aiming for her shoulder; but she's smart. With a movement of her hand, she makes her whip wrap around my wrist and pulls me closer to her.

But my leg injured leg works on my advantage this time as she's sustaining my whole body weight. And even though I'm thin, she knows that if she unwraps the whip we'll both fall, me on top of her. So none of us can use our weapons now. We're left with our other hands and arms. She must be thinking the same, because she grabs my left arm, shoving it away from her face. What she doesn't know though is that my fists do me no good. I don't have much muscle, therefore my punches are week. However, I was taught well. My weapons are my bones.

With no mercy I drive my knee to her stomach. She coughs, involuntarily, and her hands let go of what they're holding on to. As I said it'd happen, we both fall. Me on top of her. I make sure to put one of my legs on each side of her, so she won't be up. That's usual when my fighting between Leo and I ends up (on the rare cases he lets me win) so I don't keep fighting, although my rage tells me to.

"Did I give you enough to work with?" I ask, speaking on terms of evaluation.

She's breathing hard as my butt presses her stomach that was already hurt by my bony knee. Yet, somehow, she manages to answer me in a clear voice.

"I think I might like to work with you," she says, even giving me a brief smile. I have to admit that her answer surprises me. But I won't let that get my defences down. I stand up and so does she. "Fight with Leo. I want to see if he trusts his parabatai's capacities more than he trusts mine." She waits for me to nod, and I do. "Jasper, you're next!" Her voice is loud, but calm.

Staring at the ground for the whole time, I join Leo near the targets. He lends me a bow, but I shake my head.

"We're fighting." I say. I'm about to turn around and make my way towards the fighting mattress but he grabs my hand. I shake him away as soon as I feel his burning touch. He looks hurt. I don't apologize.

"We're going up there." He says, pointing to that same wooden board I was standing in the day I dreamed of our parabatai ceremony. It seems so long ago now, yet the memory is still fresh in my mind.

I nod, and start climbing the ladder knowing he's right behind me. Neither Beatriz nor Jasper stop fighting to question what we're doing.

As soon as we're both on the wooden board, exactly forty feet from the ground, the fighting starts.

From down there on the cold stoned floor, I hear some sounds of gasping, but I can't say whether they come from Beatriz, from Jas or from both. Up hear, the main sound is the sounds of daggers hitting on one another, occasionally causing some sparkling.

Unexpectedly, Leo makes a fast attack and I drop my dagger. The fighting does not stop though. I move backwards trying not to get hit by his dagger. He follows me. Although, on the opposite of Leo's feet, mine are not used to stand on such a small structure. Or at least I'm not. My right foot slips and I find myself falling. On the last minute Leo grabs my arm, sustaining my whole body weight on only one of his arms. I wonder how he doesn't fall as well.

However, looking at his eyes, I remember what he quoted when he first entered the room.

"What? Wouldn't it be easier to simply find another woman to make love to?" And with that, I force my arm out of his hand, falling straight down to the stoned grey floor.

I'm hoping for a soft landing, but my still bleeding leg doesn't make it so easy and I hear a cracking sound. Great. As if I needing nothing else than a broken ankle.

Leo lands by my side only a second later, once again supporting my weight as he expects me to fall. He heard the sound of my ankle being broken. In fact, they all did, as Jas and Beatriz are looking at me startle.

"Em, no. You got it all-" Leo starts.

"I'm out for the day." I speak over him, meaning that I cannot handle the pain. Although my pain is not the one Beatriz was referring to.

I make my way out of the room not looking back at any of them and somehow managing not to flinch even once till I shut the door close with a huge bang. After that, I collapse.

**A/N: I hope you enjoyed the new chapter. A review would be nice, if you don't mind sparing five minutes of your time writing it ****  
Best, Is.**

**P.S. The quote you found on this chapter is from a book called "This book has no title", by Jarod Kintz.**


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

Tears steer down my face as my butt hits the hard cold floor of the London Institute. My back leaning against the door of the training room. I know that I can't stay here for long, or else someone will come for me and there's no way I'm letting Leo watch me cry because of his doing. So I take out my stele and draw a couple of _Iratzes _on my leg, hoping to heal the cut Jas inflicted me and the broken ankle I inflicted myself. Soon enough, the physical pain softens.

I hear something being throw inside the training room.

"LEONARD!" That's Jas.

"Don't go after her." And that's Beatriz. Does she even know how to not speak in such a calm and controlled way? "She-"

But I don't get to hear the rest; or to see Leo coming out that room, as I know he will in a matter of seconds. The rune in the back of my neck starts burning and I black out, unexpectedly.

_Mid November, a year or so back in time. _

_I'm in a dark alley and it must be just after sunset. The sky is dark blue, but not as in _night_ dark blue – just a little lighter than that._

_It's cold and I'm starving. As far as I know, I haven't eaten for more than a day._

_I'm on an abandoned building and I'm looking for a place that is not too much windy where I can crawl up and sleep, as I'm sure not getting any food this late in the evening. _

_That's when I see it, the most horrible creature I've ever seen. Its skin is purple, textured like elephant's skin and there's no hair in sight. That's most likely all I can say about the creature. I can't figure out if it is facing me or not, as I see no eyes in it._

_It starts moving towards me, so unless it walks backwards I'm guessing we've solved the 'which side is it facing' problem. But guess what new problem just came up? It has claws! And teeth! Its mouth, that could perfectly fit my head inside it, opens and closes repeatedly as it keeps walking in my direction._

_My head tells me to move, but my feet are glued to the ground and my thin legs are frozen, not only due to the cold. I step backwards and hit a wall behind me. I'm trapped. _

_But of course, the demon did not kill me that night. A boy showed up. He was thin and fast as he threw himself over the monster, like a cat would. I screamed. A high scream that for sure broke both my and the boy's timpani. He could only be insane. I then noticed his arms were muscled after all, as he held a small dagger in one hand and a whip in the other. His brown hair looked like he'd just got out of bed, but that could be because of the strong wind outside. His eyes shined with adrenaline and madness._

_It was all so confusing and it was all happening before my eyes. And before my eyes, the creature blew into ash - or star dust, as my mom used to call it -, as the boy trespassed the creature with his small dagger. _

_Both I and the boy breathed hard as we stared at each other. He was dressed in black ripped clothes, which allowed me to see his pale skin covered in black strange tattoos. I'd never seen anything like those before. _

_His eyes, where I could now distinguish a bluish colour, were still shinning and he seemed more startled while he stared at me than he did moments ago when he found the beast. However, I could already tell by then that he wasn't the kind to stay put. Careful, he started walking towards me._

_For a moment, I didn't move. But then, terrified, I grabbed a piece of a broken brick that had been left forgotten on the dusty ground._

"_Stay away from me." I say, louder than I intended to, and pointing my piece of brick at him._

_The boy, who couldn't be more than sixteen, kept walking towards me, not even flinching at my threat. Not that I must have seemed like a big threat. A dirty street girl, bony, starving and with muddy hair and this freakish green eyes. _

_As he walked, he hid his weapons on his pockets – what kind of mad teenager carries a whip and a dagger?! I mean a lighter is already a bad sign, but a whip?! A dagger?!_

"'_Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.'" He says, relaxed. _

_He had to be completely, insanely mad. He had just killed a freakish monster that couldn't possibly exist, and he's_ quoting_ Harper Lee?_

_He was both telling me he loved to read, and that only now I learned how precious breathing was. But he was wrong. I'd been struggling to survive – on my own - for nearly two years now._

_I can see that for a second he stumbles on his own feet – surprised by my own recognition of his words, a perfect quotation of Scout, from _To Kill a Mockingbird.

_And his stumbling gives me the moment I was waiting for. With all the strength I have left, I throw my piece of brick at the boy and run past him, but not without seeing his face of surprise as my brick hits his head, just above his left eyebrow. _

I wake up in my bedroom, breathing hard and sweating from every pore my body possesses. God, from even the ones I didn't know I possessed! My head aches and so does the back of my neck.

I sit up too fast, and for a second those yellow spots that warn you that you're about to faint disturb my vision. I close my eyes for a moment and the spots vanish, thankfully.

I look around the room. The piles of books, previously organised and stuffed carefully against the wall are gone now and there's books everywhere in sight. My drawers are on the floor as well, empty. Some of my clothes are ripped, but most of them are still intact at the far end of my bed. My bathroom door is opened and inside, on the light pink floor, I see a lake of shower products all mixed up. Its bottles left carelessly empty on the sink.

In that moment, my door opens and both Jas and Drake walk in. Jas evaluates my startled expression as I look around the room

"I'm thinking you need to go shopping." He says, as he approaches the bed and sits by my side. Drake circles the bed and sits on the other side, carrying a tray with food and a wet fabric. He puts the wet fabric on my forehead.

"Leo _did _this?" I ask, fearing the answer.

Jas nods.

"I'd never seen him like that. He looked as if he'd just lost it – the remaining sanity that he had, I mean. He took you up here after he found you outside the training room and screamed for everyone to stay out. No one dared to enter. Although we were concerned, obviously." He pauses to make sure I didn't get offended.

I didn't.

"It was all silent for a while, about half an hour, I'd say. Don't ask me what he was doing." I feel an urge of running my hand over the back of my neck which is still hitching, but I manage to keep it on my lap. Jas keeps going with his story.

"Then he just freaks out and starts throwing your books and drawers like crazy. That's when we entered the room and tried to make him stop. He wouldn't. So he got to the bathroom and threw your stuff against the mirror and it all spilled on the floor. Miraculously nothing hit you. There was a moment where it seemed like he was back in control. He looked at me, Drake and Beatriz staring at him, but he didn't mind what we thought. His gaze focused on you for a while and none of us dared to make a sound even. Then he left."

"Left?" I ask. Struggling to get to my feet. The wet fabric falls from my forehead to my lap, wetting my leggings. Drake and Jas each grab one of my arms and keep me on the bed.

"Yes. But Beatriz went after him as soon as she was sure you were fine." Of course she did.

I rest my head in my hands, trying to bear the pain. This time, I'm actually referring to the physical pain. My body is tired from the break down, and both my head and the back of my neck are still aching.

"How long has it been?"

"Since he left?"

"No, since he became a dinosaur. What do you think?"

"Emma!" That was Drake, pointing out my lack politeness even when I'd just passed out for the third time this week.

"I don't know. Two, three hours, tops." Jas doesn't really give a shit about my sarcasm. May Raziel bless this boy!

I shake my head. Three hours was more than enough to get to the faeries compound and sealing a deal.

Knowing better than to try to get them past two Shadowhunters that were way stronger than me, I eat the food Drake brought me, hoping that they'll leave me alone then, and I'm free to sneak out.

But of course, Jas is cleverer than me. As Drake leaves he offers to stay with me, in case I pass out again. According to Drake I'd been burning in fever for the first hour I'd been "absent" and I should be kept an eye on. I'm aware that there's no point in fighting them.

The room becomes silent and I start to feel sleepy, but I want to be freshly awake for when news concerning Leo arrive. Therefore I feel the need to start talking. I'm not feeling particularly nice today though, and I'm still trying to get Jas out of my bedroom, so I choose a sensitive topic.

"Jas?"

"Yes, Emma."

"How'd you end up here?"

"What'd you mean? In your room?" He looked confused. "I took the stairs."

I laugh.

"No. I meant, here, on the Institute."

He pinches his lips for a while, and I think "Strike". Although I know guilt will come tomorrow and I promise myself I'll make up to him.

"Leo had told you that for me, you know? Before…" Everyone seems so reluctant when it comes to talk about the demon attack, when it's exactly what it was and there's no turning back.

"Before a memory eating demon decided I had a tasty brain."

Jas smiles.

"Exactly." Pause. "Leo spared me from the whole thing. But I guess the same luck doesn't come twice, does it?" It's not a question he's expecting me to answer.

"I used to live in Idris, with my parents and my older sister. When I was seven we decided to go on a trip together. We were all really excited about it. It was the first time I and Annie – that's my sister – were going into _this _world.

We'd been on the trip for three weeks and we were staying on a friend's house in Wales. A beautiful place near a river. What we didn't know is that that friend of ours had had a misunderstanding with a pack of werewolves a few years back, and looks like they have a good memory, because they picked that exact night to perform their revenge. They wanted to turn their arch-enemy into one of them, so he could see how it was to live their lives. But they got a little excited when they found more people in the house. They never planned to touch the children, I mean, to touch me or my sister. It was an accident…" Jas was nearly crying by then. I wanted to say something but I couldn't think of anything good enough, so I let him keep up with his story.

"After Annie's burial my parents told me they couldn't keep raising me. I cried for them not to leave me, but they kept saying I deserved better than a pair of unexperienced werewolves. Eventually I agreed on coming to live here, in the Institute. Drake wasn't the head of this place yet, his parents were, and they were all nice to me.

If there was something I did not expect to find here was this dark haired boy, with eyes that would make you believe he was looking into the inner depths of your soul – a boy who didn't quite look like a boy, but a man. A boy who'd lived a thousand lives in his books and yet claimed to never have owned one."

I was suddenly paying double attention to his words. Even though Leo was younger than Jasper, he'd come to the Institute before the second, which meant Leo was here before he's seventh birthday. But I push myself away from those thoughts.

"Jas…" I say.

Unexpectedly, he smiles to me.

"Don't pity me, Emma. My parents are fine now, they live with their own pack, and they still visit me every once in a while. Of course I'd do anything to trade places with Annie, but what's past is past. She'd want me to become the greatest Shadowhunter she'd ever met, and that's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to make her proud, wherever she is. Although I must say that both you and your dear _parabatai _make my job a little harder."

I smile.

"We're doing our jobs then." I say. Then I get serious. "She seems like an amazing girl."

"She was."

Once again, the room is hush. I feel my eyelids closing and my body doesn't have much strength left to fight them; plus it would be cruel to drive Jas back to reality now – by the distant look on his eyes I could tell he was remembering his parents.

Soon enough, I'm asleep.

I wake up to the sound of steps in the hallway. My door had been left only slightly open by Jas, and Shadowhunters ears are sensitive like that. Any sound can come from a demon. I grab my stele. Then I hear their voices.

"You're going to see her?" Beatriz's voice is clear, but low. Which means it must be late.

"I need to." Leo's voice, soft and sweet. He didn't mind keeping it low.

There's a pause and I assume Beatriz nods. They stop in front of my door and I have a glimpse of their dark figures. Leo has his back turned to me.

"Thank you." He says. "I was about to do some stupidity."

"Well, I had fun. Although I have to say it was a one night thing." I feel an urge to throw up. Did they have to say that in front of my bedroom?! "So I forgive you. But as your evaluator, I must warn you, next time I won't be so bland."

Leo nods and I stare at his dark brown messy hair curling around his neck.

"Drake must be in the library. If not, his room his on the next floor, first to the right."

"Thanks." I wondered why he was giving her this information. "And good luck. I'd think you need it."

She leaves and Leo is left alone in the hallway. He turns around on his own feet facing the door, which is already slightly opened. He takes a deep breath and walks in. I don't bother pretending I was asleep.

For a moment he looks startled at the mess he caused himself. And that no one had bothered to clean yet. Well Jas run the mop over the bathroom floor, trying to get it clean of my shower products, but it still smelled like my hair conditioner – a soft smell of apples.

Leo laced his fingers on his, as if trying to figure out how he'd clean it all up. His eyes darker than I'd ever seen them. His tiny scar shinning with the moon light coming from my window.

"I gave you that scar." I say, coming out with the stupidest thing I could remember of; however for some reason, it seemed important to me.

For the whole time I wanted to be mad at him, but only then did I realize how afraid I was I could lose him to Queen Seelie and how much I had missed him when I woke up after the break down – all the other times, he had been the one I'd wake up to.

He jumps to the sound of my voice, suddenly aware I'd been observing him the whole time. He comes join me in the bed, sitting by my side. None of us looks at each other.

"When you passed out…?" He asks.

I nod, but then I remember he mustn't be looking at me either, so I say "yes, I saw it". Where it, meant the day we met.

"Your rune was gone you know, when I found you downstairs. I couldn't let anyone see you." He's words were rushing and his voice a whisper. "So I took you up here. You were burning. You're whole body was a flame. And there were tears in your eyes. For a moment I thought I was losing you. That whatever it was that that demon did to you was getting worse." I could hear him breathing hard and fast as he relieved the moment. "But I had to keep myself grounded. For you. I redrew the rune in your neck. For the first twenty minutes it just kept fading as I drew it over and over again. But then your body temperature started to go down slowly, and I tried again. My hands were shaking and sweaty, and you too, burning up like you were, you were covered in sweat. It took me three shots till I got the rune right. But finally it stayed there. Intact, on your pale skin." He paused to breathe. My own breathing was becoming faster and faster, joining his rhythm. "I swear to you, I cried in that moment. You'd be okay, I kept telling myself. But I lost it anyway. I started to throw everything I had in sight against the walls. If the three of them hadn't come in I'm sure I'd end up killing one of us, if not both." He rested his head on his hands, in frustration. And finally, I was looking at him. He was a crying angel on a full moon's night.

"I'm fine." I say. "I'm fine."

It seemed to me like he hadn't heard me.

"I was so stupid Emma. When we were on the training room. You know me. I just say this stuff. I never thought I could hurt you, but you- you got it all wrong."

I pinch my lips.

"Yeah. I heard. It was all just to get in her pants."

He looks at me, his eyes too opened. Confusion spread all over his face.

"What the hell are you talking about?!" At least this time he heard me. But, did he really think I was that blind? Or in this case, deft.

"'_I have to say it was a one night thing._'" I even tried to copy Beatriz's voice, but I'm not as good at doing impressions as he is.

"What?! Oh!" His eyes lighted up, as though he was remembering something that had happened years ago instead of minutes ago. "Poker! She was talking about _poker_! I took her to a vampires' bar Magnus showed me. The bastards like to cheat." He was nearly screaming, and I thanked the Angel for both the fact that the Institute was a big monument and that I was the only girl inhabiting the girls side. "By the Angel, did you think-?! Oh could you be blinder?" I found it funny he used the same expression as me.

By saying so he leaned forward. I was suddenly aware that both of us had moved while we talked so I was nearly sitting on his lap. His left hand was on my tight, burning me with his touch, the way only Leo's touch could do. One of my hands was on his arm, seeking some balance, and the other one was still grabbing the stele. His right hand moved to the back of neck, touching my still burning rune. I flinched, but that didn't stop him.

His lips met mine, and we were kissing.

**A/N: Hey guys! I hope you enjoyed this new (bonus) long chapter. I'll be going on holidays for two weeks so I won't be able to write and therefore to post. I then decided I'd give you a chapter with everything you could ask for: memories, a part of Jas's past, some bad jokes too, and of course, the cliff hanger ending with what I know you've all been waiting for. I hope that when I come back I'll have lots of reviews waiting for me! :D**

**Thanks for reading.**

**Best, Is. **


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

You might be wondering how the kiss went like; it didn't. I pulled back right after I felt Leo's soft lips gently trying to open mine. Don't mistake me though, it took me quite a lot of effort push him away, but I felt like strength was abandoning my body all of sudden, just like it does whenever I have a break down and I wouldn't want to pass out while kissing Leo; that'd be terribly embarrassing, not to mention what it would do to his already huge ego.

I don't let go of him though, and thank the Angel, he doesn't let go of me as well. On the very opposite, as my sight starts to blur, I hold on to him harder than I thought I could and I'm positive that once I let go of his arm I'll find bruises with the shape of my hand.

"Emma, I'm sorry…" He starts. I tell him to hush. "Em, you're okay? Em!"

But I'm already lost in memories. This time it's different though. I'm still aware of what is happening on the real world. I could still feel Leo's burning touch as he forced my hand out of his arm in order to lay me down against his chest and I could still feel my fingers letting go of my stele which I didn't realize I was still holding on to.

However, that wasn't the only thing that was different. No, this time I didn't only get one memory, I got many. They came in flashes

_A boy whose head was still bleeding from the piece of brick that was thrown at him chasing me under the dark starless sky of London. _

_The first time I entered the Institute, a careful hand was leaning on my back, and Leo's voice telling me it would be my home from there on, as he smiled. _

_I touching the tiny scar above Leo's left eyebrow, surprised that he didn't simple used an Iratze to cure it._

_His hands on mine as he taught me how to use a bow and arrow._

_The way Leo would make the whole room smile by getting up on a chair and quoting the beginning of the Tale of Two Cities – apparently a very popular book inside the Institute of London._

and they just kept going, although neither of them lasted longer than half a second; until it finally focused on a final one.

_By the light coming from outside my bedroom window I could tell it was still dawn, a little after six in the morning, I'd say. _

_I opened my eyes to find bright blue eyes staring at me, obviously delighted with the view. Leo's smile was the greatest smile I'd ever seen on him. His whole boy radiated pure happiness. _I _radiated_ _happiness._

_It wasn't the first time I woke up to find Leo in my bed. In fact, I'd find anyone in my bed pretty usually, even Drake, who so strictly made his rule to separate boys from girls. I guess after a year training and fighting together, the rules no longer made sense. But this night was special. Not only was it my fifteenth birthday that day, but also Leo had officially asked me to be his girlfriend the night before._

"'_You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.'" I can't help but to smile myself as my heart enters the 100 meters race. "Happy Birthday." He leans forward to kiss me. A fast, daring kiss._

"_You didn't sleep?!" I ask, surprised as I ran my fingers through his dark brown curls._

_He makes a face and his smile fades only a little, as if he was disappointed with something._

"_Succumbed to sleep for a couple of hours." He sighs._

_I laugh._

"_You can watch me sleep whenever you want."_

_He shakes his head._

"_It's not the sleep. Although I have to admit it's the only thing in this world that actually remembers me you're a _girl_." He teases me. _

"_What is it then?" I ignore his teasing._

"_It's the talk. The things you say unconsciously. They're beautiful. You speak with passion, like you're quoting something. Except you're not. I've read all of your books and I found nothing like it."_

_I want to ask him what I said, although I'm pretty sure I know. You see, I like to write poems. I write them on this notebook my mom gave me before she died, but I've never let anyone seen it. Perhaps, one day, I'll give it to Leo to read it. _

_But just as I'm about to ask, the bell of the institute rings and I can tell it's no doorbell ringing. Something's going on. _

_Both Leo and I jump out of bed immediately and I grab my stele from the bedside table. I seek Leo's eyes for guidance - this is no ordinary event, this is an emergency._

"_Five in the weaponry?" He asks. I nod. He leaves, running._

_Five minutes is more than enough for me to put on my Shadowhunter clothes and to hide a few daggers on my belt and pockets. As soon as I'm done, I leave the bedroom as well. I pull my hair up on a ponytail as I make my way as fast as I can to the weaponry. _

"_Drake just got an emergency call from the Clave saying there's a demon downtown attacking everyone, no matter if they're humans, werewolves, warlocks or even the fish from the Thames." I can hear Jas's voice from the end of the hall as clear as I can hear the metallic sound of Leo and Jas getting our weapons ready. _

_As I enter the room my bow is ready for me in Jas's hands. I hang it on my shoulder and go look for a quiver, which I also hang on my shoulder._

"_Hurry up. I'll be at the gates. Backup must be almost there." Whenever it comes to demon attacks there's no room for delays._

_In a matter of seconds I and Leo are fully armed as well and ready to go. He locks the weapons room behind me and I'm about to start walking when he grabs my arm, pulling me into a passionate kiss._

_For a moment it's like the bell has stopped ringing and there's no danger anymore. His lips are impatient on mine and he definitely knows what he's doing, while my lips slow him down, hesitant and curious, as I obviously do not know what I'm doing. A smile crosses his lips mid kiss._

"_I'll be telling everyone we're dating after this. By the Angel, I'll be screaming!" He kisses me for a few seconds longer and then we both pull back and run to the gates._

I open my eyes and sit up. It happened on my birthday. The attack, the memory lost, everything happened on my birthday and they never told me.

"Em, what is it?! Your rune. It- It shined! Did you see something?" Leo was out of breath and his voice full of concern.

I find it hard to meet his gaze. My sight dances around his face. I stare at his curls, at his scar and at his lips. The lips I was once able to kiss freely. Then I meet his eyes - back in time steady and happy, now tired and confused, if not sad even. Did I do that? And then there were the dark circles above his eyes and the fact that he was so skinny. It all made sense now. He was going through a heart break and he could tell no one about it.

"Why have you never told me?" I accuse him.

"Tell you what? It was the first time it glowed, I swear." He looked so in panic that I felt the need to put my hand on his cheek to calm him down.

"You never told me we were in love." He holds his breath and looks down as his brain processes my words.

Finally he answers in a whisper.

"_Parabatai _can't date." He stands and walks around the room, leaving me on the bed. I don't move though, thinking I've hurt him too much already and I have no right to go after him. However, to my surprise, he comes back a few moments later with a book in his hands – The Codex. With no hesitation he opens the page he's looking for as if he had memorized it. Then he shows it to me as he sits by my side once more. "I've read it so many times, trying to find a way around it. But it's against the law. 'Two _parabatai _mustn't, in any case, maintain a romantic relationship. In case any of the members from the pair thinks they might nourish such feelings for the other, one most inform the Clave immediately so that safety measures can be applied.' I guess I just hoped you remembered it at least." He has no strength left to keep talking and I'd never seen him as fragile as I'm seeing now.

"You should have told me anyways." I say.

"What for?" He stares at me, startled. "It'd only hurt you." He didn't say it out loud but I could hear the echo of his words. _It'd crash me. I can't handle more pain, Em. _

I press my lips together wondering what the right approach should be, but figuring out there was no right approach, so I'm as truthful as possible.

"Because I think we still do." I had my doubts of course, my heart wasn't as fast as it was on my vision, there was no happiness now, but how else would I explain everything I've felt since the attack? The burning touch, the jealousy, the tears… Everything seemed to lead to this conclusion.

"Do what?" Leo, on the other hand, seemed to have taken no conclusions. I could only imagine how much pain I'd put him through and wonder how much of that old Leo would I get back.

I'm about to answer him when the bell rings – the same tune it rang in my memory and for a second I have this feeling that I'm having a Déjà vu. But once I'm past that feeling I get angry. Seriously? It had to ring right now?

This time I know what to do though. Leo helps me out of the bedroom – as there are still drawers and books and I don't know what else spread all over my floor – after I collect my stele. He must have his with him as well as we go straight to the training room, where we left our weapons this morning.

Drake must have been the one who rang the bell and Beatriz must have been with him as the whip and some seraphic blades are missing. Leo passes me a couple of daggers and throws a few blades at Jasper who has just entered the room. Instinctively I go for the bows, but take the two of them, one for me, one for Leo, just in case. There's only one quiver though.

"You take it." He says. I'm about to protest when he speaks again, rolling his eyes at me. "We always fight side by side." I nod and we all run to the entrance.

Beatriz is there, waiting for us. The doors are slung opened.

"Where's Drake?" Leo asks, out of breath.

"On the bell tower. It looks like the demon is coming here." For the first time, I can feel that she's tensed up.

"What you mean it's coming here?! Isn't it supposed to not know where the Institute is?" I ask.

"I think we've all agreed that someone is controlling it." We all turn around towards Drake's voice. He's running down the stairs, fully armed and dressed in black, like a Shadowhunter ready to fight.

Leo makes a whaling noise.

"When you say it, you-" But he has no time to finish. As a demon appears at the gates of the institute looking at us as if we were meat.

The demon that destroyed my life.

**A/N: Guess who is back from holidays? :D**

**Anyways, the quote Leo says was found on google and the only credit that was there was "Dr. Seuss". I do not know who that is but the quote sounded nice, so there you go.**

**I hope y'all are enjoying your holidays as well, and please review!**

**Best, Is. **


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

For a moment, I was frozen. The sight of the demon – a purple skinned beast, four feet tall, that stood slightly suspended in the air (it did not fly, it was more like it levitated) – brought to me a sense of fear I did not know I possessed. And for that exact same moment, everyone else's eyes were on me.

I know what they were thinking: my demon, my call.

The demon and I exchanged looks. It cannot enter past the gates but something tells me it does not mind waiting. Knowing I'm acting stupidly, but seeing no other option I run towards the gates, bow in aim and ready to shoot.

I hear my name being called out behind me but I do not turn around. Although my mind doesn't remember how to shoot an arrow, my hands still do. I'm perfectly aware I will not shoot as flawlessly as I did before though. Obviously not. A bow is a weapon that requires concentration and harmony – between your hands and your mind – and I possess neither at the moment. However, when I think I'm close enough to the demon, I shoot the first arrow, missing for only a few inches. The thing doesn't even flinch. Automatically my hands get another arrow in place and I shoot it, not pausing for aiming, not pausing for thinking. The arrow hits straight on the gates locker and such gates open. Shit.

I see what must be a demon smile – all the thing's teeth come in sight, like more clearly in sight than they were before – and it starts moving, flying, or whatever it does towards us. I shoot a few more arrows as I step backwards; only one of them finds its target though. Greyish blood drops from the wound but the demon does not stop. I hit something with my back and when I feel strong arms wrapping around me and trying to force me inside the Institute I'm sure it's Jasper. Leo surely told him to do so. So much for the fighting together.

"After such exhaustive search I'd thought I'd welcomed by you, Emma. Clearly, I misjudged you." A laugh comes out of the thing – a sick vicious laugh. "But then again one with no memories is no one, and no one cannot be judged."

I have a glimpse of Leo's seraph blade behind the demon as I try to fight my way out of Jas's arms.

Finding me speechless, the demon keeps talking.

"I did not came for you though. No. Don't take it personally, but you're just not the right one. I do have to say your memories were pretty interesting, specially the last ones, if you-"

But the demon has no time to finish its sentence. Just as I gather enough rage to fight Jas and set myself free, Leo jumps over the thing's tiny wings. I let out a scream of surprise, but I do not stop as I run to help my _parabatai_.

Leo and the demon are now rolling around on the grass and I watch Leo's hand desperately trying to get a dagger out of his belt. Automatically, I take one of my own daggers and throw it. Leo stretches his hand out just in time to grab it and stab it on the demons back, setting himself free. His gear his covered with both demon blood and red fresh blood – he was injured.

That's about when Jas and Beatriz come into action; she uses her whip to immobilize the demon's wings, preventing the creature from flying. Thrusting them to doom the thing, I run for Leo instead, dropping my bow on the ground midway.

As soon as I reach him I notice that it was no small injury. The demon had not only trusted its claws deep down on Leo's back as they rolled on the grass, but it had also bitten him on the shoulder, using all its little teeth.

I get on my knees and rest Leo's head on my lap. As soon as my hands meet his skin I let out a cry, as the demon blood burns my skin. I had completely forgotten about the effects such substance had when it came in contact with our skin, and I could not see it burning Leo's skin in the dark. Cursing myself I take my stele out of my pocket.

Leo lets out a small cry he had been holding and I watch his face contorting in pain and his chest moving up and down faster than usual. The form of the runes still take time to come to my mind but as soon as I have an _Irazte _as my only thought my burned hands start unconsciously working. I draw a rune near the bite and two more on Leo's back – which takes a whole lot of effort from me as I have to sustain half of his body weight.

Slowly Leo's expression softens and his breath decelerates slightly, allowing him to speak.

"Thank you." His voice is barely a whisper.

I move his dark hair away from his face and lower myself to kiss his forehead. Then, aware of what I'd just done I look around. The garden had fallen silent though and neither Drake, nor Jas, nor Beatriz were in sight. Relieved, I say:

"Of course."

I think I should go find them and help with the demon, but I cannot force myself away from Leo. Not when he's so fragile.

An awkward silence falls between us for a few minutes. I watch demon's poison coming out of Leo's shoulder wound, as the _Iratzes _did their job. Then, thank the angel, Jasper comes from inside the Institute. Joining me, he helps me getting Leo to his feet.

"Did you kill it?" I ask, not knowing exactly what I wanted to hear. If they did, and my memories had not returned to me, I was positive that part of me had just been lost most likely forever. If they hadn't, it meant the thing could still hurt someone; take away somebody else's memories.

"No." Unconsciously, I sigh. "We managed to control it, in a manner of speaking, and Drake is now questioning it on the training room." So that's where Drake was. Jasper keeps going. "Of course it'd be better to have the help of a warlock but not only Magnus is back to his home in New York, but also the damn thing killed the only _gentle _warlock that we knew to be living in London. If we don't find another one fast the demon is more likely to kill itself than to gives us what we want." Also known as, my memories.

We were already halfway towards my bedroom and we did not speak the rest of the way. Jasper and I too lost in our thoughts to say anything and Leo too weak to even _think _of saying something. Or at least I thought so.

Despite the whole mess in my bedroom we managed to drop him in my bed and as soon as he had a look at my hands, he instantly grabbed me by the wrist and pulled his stele out.

"Trying to get even bonier than you already are?" He said, referring to the fact that the demon's blood was still burning my skin and that soon enough would get to the flesh and eventually to my bones. My hands were not _that _bad though. The amount of blood I touched was barely any blood at all when compared to the amount that had burned Leo's still in the process of healing skin.

He draws an _Iratze _on my wrist and then let's go of it. I could have set it free any time and drawn it myself, as his grip was far too weak, but I didn't want him to feel useless, not when he had thrown himself over the demon that had haunted me for so long just when said demon was about to give us away, as he spoke about that last night before the attack.

I was dying to know what was happening on the training room right now but I had more important business in hands. I had to make sure my _parabatai _would be fine.

"Jas, take his clothes off, would you?" I ask as I go seek some towels in my bathroom. As soon as I get them I pass them under cold water and go back into the room.

I stumble on my own feet at the sight of a shirtless Leo. Thankfully, none of them gave it much importance as there were drawers and books still spread all over my bedroom floor.

"I don't think there's any need of taking his pants off as the creature's blood did not reach his skin there." I found myself blushing at the thought of actually having Leo on his underwear on my bed, but still manage to nod. "I'm going to get him some clean shirt." Jas then looks at the piece of Leo's gear on his hand. "And throw this out."

I wait for him to leave and close the door before I start cleaning the dried demon blood of Leo's skin. I hear him smile every once in a while, as I tickle him.

"Bet you were dying to see me shirtless." He teases. My cheeks and earlobes burn.

"Not even on the doors of death could you shut up, could you?" Intentionally, I make more pressure on his injured shoulder. Caught by surprised, he cries out in pain. Then he looks at me startled. "Just making sure it's fully clean. It would be really annoying if it infected."

I tell him to turn lye belly down and he rolls on the bed, forcing me to climb it and sit by his side. This new positions, however, allowed me to appreciate his body for longer without he knowing it, as I slowly run the wet towel across his back.

As I previously knew, his skin was very pale – probably for barely coming out of the Institute, or for when he did, it was the moon that rose up in the sky and not the sun. But what surprised me was that his back's hair and chest's hair did not match the colour of his dark brown curls; no, instead, the first, were blonde. And they were in such a low quantity that I would probably have missed them, had I not possess a cat's vision.

His muscles were tensed up, by the pain, yet his rib cage bones and his spine were still visible. And his waist was _so _slim, much more than I'd remembered when I had grabbed him in my vision.

Soon enough, there was no more blood to clean so I told him he could turn back belly up again. This time, he did not roll though. He turned around on himself, so that he was right next to me – closer than appropriated between a boy and a girl, but completely normal between two _parabatai_ who claimed to fully trust each other.

His hand met my burning cheek just as his bright blue eyes locked on mine and I was too afraid to move.

"I'm sorry." He says. "For not having told you."

He needn't tell me what he was referring to, I knew instantly. And I saw too, by the look on his eyes, and the carefulness of his hand on my cheek that he still loved me. But there was nothing we could do.

His thoughts must have been meeting the ones I had this morning, as when he speaks, his voice his full of doubt and perhaps hope.

"Emma, when you- when you kissed me outside-" I watch him struggle with his own words before I cut him off.

"I don't know what happened." I sigh, in frustration. "All I know right now is that you're my _parabatai _and you were hurt, and I'd do anything to make you feel better."

"And you figured your lips might have magical healing powers and you decided to try them on me?" His faces lightens up as he smiles, although the smile does not reach his eyes and I see whatever that I'd seen just a few moments ago vanish. "Because I heard it's more effective if you kiss the other person's lips, you know?"

"If only they could heal silliness." I mock him.

He rolls his eyes to me, then he gives me a serious face. His fingers still running up and down my jaw line, thoughtlessly, as if he'd done it many times before. Which I'm starting to believe he did.

"Anything?"

"What?"

"Would you do anything at all, to make me feel better?" He asks.

"Hmm." I say, as if I was giving it a second thought. "Nah. I don't think so. I was just trolling you. I'd be more likely to actually _pay _the demon to kill you."

He pulls me into a hug and tickles me, playfully.

"You little bastard!" He exclaims.

I do not reply to him though, as my vision blurs for a second and I see my mom doing the exact same thing to me. It was the first time I was seeing any memory of my parents and it was also the first real happy memory I'd had. I mean, the ones I'd had a few hours ago were sort of happy too, but they'd brought me misery, while this one, on the very opposite was a memory that was not whose happiness could not be corrupted.

So when I look up to face Leo, I smile.

"Yes, anything at all." I say, seriously this time.

He smiles back, but he has no time of saying anything else as the door slams opened, hitting the wall and Beatriz is at the door, face red, as if she'd just run all the way from the training room, and breathing hard.

I stood up immediately to assist her, and Leo intended to do the same but I told him to stay in the bed and my voice must have sounded threatening as he did not dare to stand.

"Beatriz, what is it? What happened?" All my hatred for her had vanished the moment I saw her running for the demon. I could have said it had vanished when I found out Leo loved _me_, but I'd be lying. That tip of jealously had been there all along, until she fought like she was one of us when she knew nothing of my story, when she had not been there when the attack took place and she had not been put through what all of us had the last few months.

"I was just- outside the room." She makes pauses to breathe as she speaks. "Drake had asked me- to do so. But then- it all fell silent. And I felt- like there was- something wrong. So- when I came inside the room." She seemed to be recovering control of her breath as she kept going. And the demon, the thing- it was gone." She paused to look at the two of us as if she still had something left to say. "And it took Drake with it."

I felt my heart beating faster and I had to lean against the wall as I suddenly felt sick. While I'd been here telling jokes with Leo, the thing, the creature, the memory eating demon, took something else away from me. As if my whole life had not been enough.

Jas enters the room that exact moment with a clean shirt on his hand.

"Did I miss something?"

My mind did not assimilate his words though. My thoughts were lost back in time, not too much back though, only a few minutes really, while we were still in the heat of the fight and the demon was trying to get me on my nerves. There was something that he said that I should have paid better attention to.

_I did not came for you though (…) you were just not the right one._

We had been fooled.

**A/N: I have really nothing to say than, please review as your opinion would be more than important to me. Thanks for reading!**

**Best, Is.**


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